Aye, that adds some useful info I wasn't fully privy to.

And to your last point, the US is even more unreliable as allies when we've been kicking rocks in the Middle East for 20+ years. And now after all of that wasted time, resources, and manpower the US military is a shell of its former self. (And of course, those countries we were "helping" have just folded in on themselves more or less the second we left)

No one wants to get involved with US abroad operations after that entire period, and on top of that the military has become so pozzed with woke politics that it's gutting what little quality it might've had left. At least where its leadership is concerned, not that US brass has really been worth a damn for decades.